Not content with cutting arts budgets, Camden council is now trying to stop one of the country’s top drama schools from earning money from advertising hoardings.

Gavin Henderson, principal of Royal Central School of Speech and Drama whose alumnae include Kristin Scott Thomas, is in a fury after the college was told to rip down some hoardings which have been standing next to Swiss Cottage Tube station for three decades.

The hoardings make Royal Central £150,000 a year — used for charitable purposes, not least on arts education in Camden. But the council says the hoardings must come down for aesthetic reasons. “It seems bonkers,” rages Henderson.